Odd issue with windows xp pro not recognising a disk

Recently upgraded my system, new motherboard, video and RAM.
well, windows borks as usual, as I changed chipsets, so I proceed to do a repair install. (not wanting to reinstall from scratch again like I was forced to a couple weeks ago)
anyway, I uninstall a piece of software (AVG Free, the repair install apparently broke it) and reboot, I then get this:

Windows could not start because of a computer disk hardware configuration problem.

Could not read from the selected boot disk. Check boot path and disk hardware.

so I search a bit and find a Microsoft KB article, this one: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314477/EN-US/
and follow it, trying methods 2-4, rebooting after each one. Well, method 4 finally worked. I proceeded to install the motherboard software (nforce 2 drivers) and it broke yet again with the same message. Tried a regular "Chkdsk /p" but that didn't work, had to do a full "chkdsk /r" for some reason. Well, it got working again and this time I got a couple reboots before it broke again (did win updates and it went *boom* this time)

I am running XP Pro SP2 with all the latest updates (installed from a copy of xp pro with SP2 slipstreamed on)

yet further weirdness, it Just happened again after I installed the video drivers, so I put the xp pro (sp2) CD in the drive to fire up the recovery console and rebooted, well, I didn't notice it and it actually made it to windows successfully, so I install the logitech mouse drivers, reboot and it happens again, so I reboot, same problem, do the same thing, put xp cd in, reboot, start typing and next thing I know, it's in windows. Ok, so I run a couple benchmarks and reboot the system, shows up again, reboot a couple more times and it shows up both times. plop the xp cd in and it suddenly works again.

yes, I was typing this up on another machine while I was mucking about with the system

anyone have any ideas what's going on? Apologies for the long post, but i'm trying to be through

i've got three hard drives in the system (two optical drives as well, i've got a extra IDE controller in the system)
Hard drives 1 and 2 are primary and slave on the main motherboard controller
both optical drives are on the secondary motherboard controller
Hard drive 3 is on a extra IDE controller (but it's just data storage, nothing installed on it)

My partition setup (all of theese in order as on the disk)
HD1:
~170Meg FAT32 partition (Primary) (long story, used to dual boot 98se and xp, I don't anymore, it's a placeholder now)
logical:
The rest (~78Gig) NTFS

Swapping mobos and trying to save the 'old' installation is almost never going to work.
Bite in the sour apple and install from scratch, incl. the drivers from the new mobo, that came on a CD with it.
You'll have a much smoother Windoze.
Make a dual-boot, by installing on the C-Drive.
You can keep your old XP until everything has been 'ported' to the new partition.

Swapping mobos and trying to save the 'old' installation is almost never going to work.
Bite in the sour apple and install from scratch, incl. the drivers from the new mobo, that came on a CD with it.
You'll have a much smoother Windoze.
Make a dual-boot, by installing on the C-Drive.
You can keep your old XP until everything has been 'ported' to the new partition.

Click to expand...

then explain how i've done it three times now with no problems whatsoever.

I was somewhat hoping to avoid this, as I had just been forced to do a fresh reinstall like a week and a half before I got the motherboard. I'll have to drag out partition magic and resize the disk, though. (it's currently like really tiny, less than 200 meg total)

in retrospect, I probably should have done said fresh reinstall on the C drive, but well, hindsight is always 20/20

I was somewhat hoping to avoid this, as I had just been forced to do a fresh reinstall like a week and a half before I got the motherboard. I'll have to drag out partition magic and resize the disk, though. (it's currently like really tiny, less than 200 meg total)

Click to expand...

well, just did that and it appears to be working. now to begin the long process of reinstalling everything *again* (what I had hoped to aovid, as I had just finished getting most everything reinstalled)

and so, the reboot spree begins (blasted windows... you look at it funny and you need a reboot)